Volkspistole
|barrel=Walther: |weight= |justweight=Walther: |width= |height= |magazine=8-round detachable box magazine |cycle= |effective= |range= |usedby= |velocity= }} The Volkspistole (German for People's Pistol) is a series of last-ditch German pistol designs. History Designed around 1944 due to a massive shortage of handguns, the Volkspistoles were built on past experiences by major firearm manufacturers like Mauser and Walther, where they attempted to simplify and make the production of their weapons cheaper, along with developing new weapons based on this principle. In 1944, 110,092 handguns were lost in the first half of the year, with this number rising to 282,701 by the end of the year; the substantial amount of losses could not be compensated by all three manufacturers of the Walther P38; Walther, Mauser and Spreewerk. Due to the massive shortage on handguns, there were unforeseen consequences for the Volkssturm, where their first units could not be equipped by late 1944. Even though the Gauleiter were authorized to receive weapons from the armament factories in their districts, said weapons could only be obtained via over-production or after an army contract had run out. By the end of 1944, a request for the Volkspistole was submitted, and the experience that both Walther and Mauser had would be useful in this situation, and these pistols would have to be produced much faster than anything that ever came before. A meeting between Haupt-Dienststellenleiter Karl-Otto Saur, SS-Obergruppenführer Gottlob Berger and other members of the Technisches Amt took place on November 30, 1944, the final verdict of the meeting was that Saur was to get a monthly supply of 20,000 Volkspistoles, and Saur sent a report to SS-Standartenführer and Wehrwirtschaftsführer Erich Purucker the next day, who in turn sent it to Walther. His order was accepted on January 4, 1945 as War-Order Nr.1005 Waffen SS. Walther was already finding it hard to produce the Volkspistole due to already having their hands full in producing the P38, Gewehr 43 and VG1 for the Wehrmacht and Volkssturm, in addition to it being already quite difficult to gather up all the raw materials needed for mass-production; this troubled Fritz Walther enough to cause him to write a letter to Purucker on January 24, 1945. As a result of said letter, Walther received yet another letter from Purucker, who said that the order would now be classified as the top-priority Führer-Notprogramm, but it remains questionable whether this order was of any use at all, due to the few surviving pistols not suggesting any form of large-scale serial production. Due to those factors, nothing was left of the Volkssturm by the end of the war. A few Walther Volkspistoles are known to currently exist, with some in the hands of collectors. One Mauser Volkspistole is known to exist, in the hands of the United Kingdom's Pattern Room. One Mauser HSc-patterned Volkspistole is also known to exist, but its whereabouts are unknown. Design Details As is with most last ditch designs, the Volkspistole was a heavily simplified design of a hammer-fired pistol intended for mass-production over a short period of time. The weapon was made of stamped steel, with more important parts crucial to the function of the weapon being made of true solid steel. The Walther's slide is actually made of two halves of sheet metal held together by the grasping grooves fitting into slots inside the halves of the slide. Most parts of the weapon were held together by bolts and rivets; only the side grip panels were actually screwed on. Disassembly of the pistol causes the massive simplicity of the Volkspistole design to become more evident; for example, the Walther's barrel only being held in the weapon by a cylindrical plug which can be retracted by manipulating a lever on the left side of the pistol, allowing the barrel to be removed, and in turn, the whole slide assembly. Inside the Walther's slide lies a heavily simplified bolt with only two locking lugs which absorb all the recoil force when firing. Few markings are visible on all versions of the pistol. Variants Walther made one variant of the pistol, and Mauser made two; one unique and one based on their HSc pistol. Despite their different appearances, they are functionally identical. Prototypes of the pistol were also made by Gustloff Werke. References *[http://www.forgottenweapons.com/the-walther-volkspistole/ Article on Forgotten Weapons] Category:Pistols Category:Prototypes